1. Field of the Invention.
The emphasis in recent months and years has been to leave elderly persons in their own homes rather than to provide care for them in public facilities where husky attendants and expensive and sophisticated equipment is available to meet their needs. This has resulted in many married couples and other groups of elderly persons living by themselves in single family dwellings attempting to take care of themselves without any substantial or regular outside assistance.
This invention has relation to structures for allowing persons without full physical abilities to enter and leave a bathtub safely with the help of but one attendant.
2. Description of Prior Art.
Many structures have been proposed for supporting chairs or seats above and/or within bathtubs to help persons who cannot enter and leave bathtubs unaided. These include structures which are designed to be permanently mounted to tubs such as shown in U.S. Pat. No. 2,045,110 granted to Spiess on June 23, 1936 and U.S. Pat. No. 3,624,666 granted to Higgins on Nov. 30, 1971. Such structures have the distinct disadvantage that the use of the tub is more or less dedicated to the use of the person needing the aid; and a spouse or other persons in the same household must go elsewhere or "put up with" this installation in order to use the same bathtub.
Bath chair structures have been devised which must be laboriously fastened in place each time the handicapped person is to use the tub, and must be just as laboriously unfastened and removed before another household occupant can have unfettered use of the tub. Such structures are shown in the following U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,203,008 granted to Murcott on Aug. 31, 1965; 3,022,518 granted to Hayden on Feb. 27, 1962; 2,142,434 granted to Bentz on Jan. 3, 1939; 1805,297 granted to Sadusky on May 12, 1931. Also adaptable for use in this same manner is the teaching of U.S. Pat. No. 3,718,365 to Gibson for a SEAT ATTACHMENT FOR BOATS, granted Feb. 27, 1973.
Some structures have been devised which include a platform and a chair rotatably but also slidably mounted on a platform and which is merely set on top of a bathtub. These rely on the force of gravity to hold them in place; and tend to be, or at least to feel, less stable than structures where the framework or platform is fixed and the chair does not slide. See, for example, U.S. Pat. No. 2,237,076 to Kenney et al, granted Apr. 1, 1941. Another simple bathtub seat which is merely set in place on hooks overhanging the edge of the bathtub is the ancient U.S. Pat. No. 657,640 to Brown, granted Sept. 11, 1900.
None of these patents, and no prior art or combination of prior art known to the present inventor and those in privity with him will allow, for example, one of two married people to assist the other into and out of a bathtub safely without having to, at some point, lift or support substantially the full weight of the other person in the process.
The patents cited above do show structures which are designed to allow a person with a physical disability to sit on a chair with feet over the edge of the tub and then to swing those feet up over the edge of the tub while swiveling around with the chair. However, none show how to accomplish this with the firmness, solidity and rigidity of a permanent installation while still providing that the structure can be easily removed and replaced in order that it be clear of the tub when it is not needed.
The patents discussed above were located during a Patent Office search on the invention set out herein. Neither the inventor nor those in privity with him are aware of any closer prior art or any prior art which anticipates claims made herein.